I wake in the middle of the night with the sun well positioned below the horizon. What light exists comes from stars, the moon, airglow, or the indirect light of nearby never-sleeping cities. I am awake, but don’t want to be.
Sometimes I get up and walk to the kitchen for a drink of water, then stand at the French door, looking at the sky. By now Earth is turning toward light as the sky begins to lose its blackness. Below the horizon, shapes blend into a singular darkness. Above, stars and planets are still visible. Light has begun to penetrate, thinning the darkness.
Our child called it “blue thirty:” the point where sunlight begins to dominate the sky. The sky is briefly a dark shade of blue. They noticed this while camping and taught me to look for it. The silhouettes of grounded objects emerge from darkness, becoming recognizable forms.
Now I want to turn on lights and wake. The horizon has become readable, and the urge to create something is present at nautical twilight. I make coffee and go to my writing place.
After donning hiking shoes, I walk toward the state park trail at first light. From obscuring darkness, the day takes shape in colors—greens, browns, and blues. It begins in semi-darkness with loud migrating birds—geese in late winter and songbirds in spring. Bird sounds surround me as I pick up the pace to increase my heart rate. I can see the trail changing from dark to light at my feet.
The sky puts on a show as dawn breaks. In pinks, reds, and golds, refracting sunlight makes the sky dance as an artist paints a canvas. Dawn arrives in colorful glory.
By the time I round the turn toward home, the sun rises. Direct light illuminates the trail, with long shadows of trees, bushes and other vegetation. The day has become clear—with things to do.
As I finish the turn, I feel my pulse and walk toward the rising sun.
Supporting the environment has changed since the first Earth Day. Then the president was aware of public support for protecting the environment and took concrete action. Now, the president couldn’t give two hoots in a holler about it, as evidenced by his support for copper mining in the Boundary Waters. Times have changed, even as the climate crisis knocks on our door daily with some new deviation from what used to be normal conditions.
I wrote about my personal progress in an unpublished memoir:
From Earth Day to Climate Reality
My advocacy for environmental causes came in two time periods: one that began in high school with the first Earth Day, and the second after joining the Johnson County Board of Health. Two and a half years after leaving the board of health, I joined the Climate Reality Project.
The first Earth Day on April 22, 1970, was part of a cultural phenomenon which got the president’s attention. I participated in the event while in high school. When the Council on Environmental Quality and the Environmental Protection Agency were created soon after, I felt a palpable relief. Government was taking responsibility. These actions assuaged my high school concerns about the environment. With the government now involved, I could turn my attention to other things.
While on the board of health, Maureen McCue and I were active advocating for regulation of toxins in the environment, especially for better air quality. This was a combination of my family’s history of working in coal mines, my grandfather’s suffering and death from black lung disease, and new concerns about air quality raised while I was on the board of health. The main work was to advocate against the use of coal for electricity in Iowa. Planned coal-fired power plants were held back in Waterloo and Marshalltown by a coalition of environmental groups of which we were a part.
The film An Inconvenient Truth was released in 2006 and won the Academy Award for best feature-length documentary of the year. It featured former Vice President Al Gore presenting the science and risks of climate change to a mass audience. Inspired by the force and clarity of that narrative, I traveled to Chicago in July 2013 and participated in the Climate Reality Leadership Program which trained us to present climate science and promote solutions in our communities.
Gore gave his Inconvenient Truth presentation twice, once as he had in the film, and then once on the second day with explanations about each point. During the training we learned about the latest science of climate change, best practices in public speaking, and connecting with an audience, communication strategies, social media, leadership skills, and community outreach and organizing.
The goal was to teach attendees to give the presentation ourselves and advocate for the environment in our home communities. In return for the training, I agreed to make 10 presentations using course materials. I would go on to attend training three more times, serving as a mentor to others. Importantly, I gave presentations where I could attract an audience: at an event at the Solon Public Library, and on farms, and throughout the region. Being a Climate Reality Leader helped me feel like I was part of something bigger than myself. I particularly enjoyed sitting with Al Gore and a small group of leaders at the Cedar Rapids training, talking about issues of the day.
Increased awareness of climate science helped me reinterpret a lifetime of weather. As a child, my father took me to the bank of the Mississippi River to see the record flood of 1965. The flood water seemed endless then and was unforgettable. At the time, it stood out as a singular event.
Singular events accumulated.
In April 1973, more than twenty inches of snow fell across Iowa in what should have been spring. In 1993, as we were building our home in Big Grove Township, a flood described as a 500-year event delayed construction by a month. In 2008, another “500-year” flood backed water into the watershed of a nearby 900-acre lake, stopping barely a hundred yards from our front door. The change in intensity of events was noticeable, particularly the flooding which had been commonplace when I was in grade school.
Precipitation was extreme, yet there were also heat waves. Farmers still talk about the 2012 drought. It was so hot and dry for such a long period that corn leaves curled upward to preserve moisture, and yields dropped sharply. Drought returned from 2020 through 2024, described by the state climatologist as the longest since the 1950s.
In 2019, I measured thirty-five degrees below zero at home as the foundation creaked and a lower-level window broke. On August 10, 2020, I watched a derecho tear through the neighborhood, damaging all but one tree on our lot and uprooting three entirely. Cleanup became routine. Repairs were expected.
Straight line winds, derechos, droughts, tornadoes, Iowa has always had severe weather. What changed was the frequency and the scale. Individually, each event could be dismissed as weather. Together, they formed a pattern. Climate Reality offered a way to address causes rather than consequences—to work upstream instead of continually rebuilding downstream. That was hopeful.
Politicians and industry were slow to respond to our advocacy. All the same, we kept at it. I had an opportunity to talk about coal-fired power plants with Bill Fehrman, then president and CEO of MidAmerican Energy, at an event at Old Brick in Iowa City. To say it politely, he knew how to handle me, pointing to their expansion into wind generated electricity and said they would eventually eliminate coal from their electricity generation mix. I made several trips to lobby in Des Moines with both Republicans and Democrats. With Democrats, I was preaching to the choir. Republicans appeared to listen.
I wrote letters to the editor and guest opinions, I was interviewed by radio and television reporters, I participated in large conferences and my own scheduled events. One time I gave an abbreviated version of the Inconvenient Truth lecture to three farmers while helping them plant crops at a nearby vegetable farm. I did what I could to raise awareness of the ongoing climate crisis.
It has been a rainy week. Too much moisture in the garden to plant, and constant showers to keep me inside. When the weather is like this, I make a point to find space between rain clouds and get in my 30-minute daily morning walk. A two-hour rain delay is typical.
When I finally got on the trail, I took this photo. There are two geese. The one on the left is ducking its head in the water while the other keeps watch. I don’t usually see them this close to shore.
While waiting for the rain to end, I emailed U.S. Senators Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst to vote no on HJR 140 which pertains to opening the Boundary Waters to foreign copper mining. It took a couple of minutes. Here is what I said:
I urge you to vote NO on House Joint Resolution 140, the Congressional Review Act targeting the Boundary Waters mineral withdrawal. The Twin Metals mine is owned by a foreign company that has an agreement with China to smelt the copper in China for free — and China gets the copper. The United States gets nothing but the pollution. No United States Senator should support this anti-American bill that would allow China to pollute our most treasured wilderness to gain a competitive edge over us. Please stop it by voting NO.
Bread on the water. The resolution needs only a simple majority, which if they get it, Poof! The Boundary Waters are open to mine runoff. That is, after the inevitable lawsuits end.
On Thursday, the Senate approved the resolution in a 50-49 vote, so folks are lawyering up.
One day this week a beaver was swimming a few yards off shore. They are common in the area and occasionally cut down trees along the lake shore. I have also seen mink on the trail. It reminds me of a time when natives trapped fur-bearing creatures to trade with white people. Typically that was in autumn.
I once visited the House on the Mound in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, built by Hercules Dousman. He managed trading operations for John Jacob Astor’s American Fur Company in the Upper Mississippi Valley. The Victorian-style home was luxurious by any standard. It was called the house on the mound because it was built upon an ancient native burial mound. Dousman flourished on the Wisconsin frontier. “As a fur trader, railroad builder, grain-shipper, he became the most influential figure of the upper Mississippi Valley and the Midwest’s first millionaire,” wrote August Derleth in his 1958 book The House on the Mound.
The beaver I saw seemed unaware of the value of its fur.
If we look closely, there is evidence of lives lived long ago all around us. I used to go with a friend to Palisades Kepler Park near Mount Vernon to climb the bluffs overlooking the Cedar River. I don’t do rock-climbing any more, but I used to enjoy it. On top of those bluffs were Native American burial mounds.
According to Google search results, “The Native American mounds located along the bluffs, represent the prehistoric Woodland Indian culture. These sacred sites include conical and effigy mounds that are often knee-high, with some reaching up to six feet, serving as a reminder of early indigenous habitation.” The burial mounds are some of the last remaining in the area. So many of them were turned into farm land, or like the House on the Mound, built upon by white settlers.
Whether it is waiting out a rain delay or observing our habitat, it is easy to feel connected to nature, and to civilizations that went before us. We forget that Iowa wasn’t always a grid of farms, towns and cities. There were woodlands and prairies, and pure springs flowing within walking distance of where we built our home. On days like this I can imagine the grid being lifted, then walking this land like Natives did in the 17th and 18th Centuries. I live for that imagining. It can be who we are.
When the heat pads, LED light positions, and folding table in the dining room are full of trays of seedlings, it is time to move the garden outdoors. That means setting up the portable greenhouse. A round of indoor planting has been completed. All that is left is breaking down peppers and tomatoes from channel trays into individual soil blocks, and starting squash and cucumbers indoors when the seeds arrive. From here on, the focus is on planting garden soil.
It took me about 90 minutes to reassemble the greenhouse. I let it sit overnight, then began moving plants from indoors. The forecast is for no freezing overnight temperatures the rest of the week, so it was as good a time to get it up. The forecast Monday and Tuesday is highs in the 80s. Yikes! It’s April 13!
I finished the plot where I started potatoes. Next moving southward are leeks, onions, turnips and radishes. I fenced these in, although I don’t have mulch so I will return soon with the hoop hoe to weed and fertilize.
The roots of the locust tree that blew over in the derecho were finally deteriorated enough to dig them up. Last year I set two brush fires over the stump in an attempt to burn it out. Now the large pieces of root are stacked next to the composter, awaiting disposition. They are rotted enough, and most likely I will take the four-pound sledge to them and work them into the compost. Planting the trees there and leaving them was a mistake that years later has been rectified.
While I was turning soil in the plot for cruciferous vegetables and digging up tree roots, a neighbor walked down the hill toward me from their home on an adjacent lot. She carried a package with pieces of focaccia and sourdough as a gift. We chatted about spring—and the moles in our yards. Moles and voles have spread throughout the neighborhood. It makes no sense to eliminate them in a single yard without eliminating them everywhere. In our country setting, it’s not certain any approach would rid us of them permanently, so live and let live, I say. It’s another part of the habitat.
While moving seedlings to the greenhouse I had a good look at them all. The February plantings are getting big, and this week is time for them to go into the ground. I planted five collard seeds and only four survived, so I planted six more on Sunday. Everything else can use more time in the greenhouse.
I took measurements and decided on a 90″ x 246″ space for the first cruciferous vegetables. That makes four rows spaced 22.5 inches apart with 13 plants per row. Next steps here are to fertilize and till the soil, lay down plastic ground cover and get the seedlings in the ground. There are not enough kale and collard plants to fill all the spots, so I may make two rows of either broccoli or cauliflower or both. I need to count seedlings. However this turns out, the area will get fenced in before nightfall on planting day.
During the first week of gardening, the work simply presents itself. There is no written plan. The seasons of gardening I’ve conditioned into myself over 43 years of growing things on our property guide me, almost unawares.
Part of the forestry preserve at Lake Macbride State Park.
I was taken aback by the administration’s decision to dismantle the U.S. Forest Service. Jim Pattiz outlined what happened in his substack post, “Trump Administration Orders Dismantling of the U.S. Forest Service.” What they are doing is bad. While the news broke suddenly, and agreements were signed quickly, the future of roughly 193 million acres of forests and grasslands not carved up with roads or clear cut logging has been up in the air for decades. With this administration, loggers and anti-government agents appear to be getting their way.
In 1970, Joan Didion opened her celebrated book The White Album by saying, “We tell ourselves stories in order to live.” The U.S. Forest Service action reminded me of this and the competing stories it represents.
One story, summarizing Scott Russell Sanders in A Conservationist Manifesto, goes like this. The national forest represent a wilderness with something to teach us. We are part of a living biome. We should protect these wild places as a habitat for wildlife, as a reservoir of natural processes, and as a refuge for the human spirit. The U.S. Forest Service adds a layer by being a research arm of the federal government.
Another story , according to Sanders, asserts that to “lock up” these acres from development would cost jobs, handicap economic growth, and “threaten the American way of life by denying us access to fuel and timber.” We Americans should be free to go into the warehouse that is nature and do whatever we want, regardless of consequences. It is squandering resources to not harvest timber from national forests and refrain from building roads there.
My story is we lie to ourselves by saying we can lawsuit our way out of this. Already, the Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club filed lawsuits challenging the USDA’s “interim final rule” that removed public comment and environmental review procedures for forest projects, arguing the fast-track rules violate the Administrative Procedure Act and the National Environmental Policy Act. I wish them well. But shouldn’t we be able to agree that the 8.5% of land these acres represent should be set aside and preserved? It is very American to settle this in courts rather than in the hearts and minds of citizens.
In typical fashion for this administration, they are moving very quickly to dismantle the U.S. Forest Service, using the playbook developed to change the Bureau of Land Management during Trump 1.0. The headquarters will move from Washington, D.C. to Utah, and much of the research into how to prevent forest fires, and related issues will apparently end. Many employees will resign because they can’t support what the administration is doing or leave because moving to Utah is not a pleasant prospect. This is the change Republicans seek.
On my daily walks through the woods on a gravel trail, I consider the quiet and beauty of place. The sounds of bird life fill the air, and the air breathes fresh and clean, that is, unless a wind blows in from a concentrated animal feeding operation. We all need this type of solace from time to time.
We do what we can to survive in a Republic. Lawsuits are part of that as are competing stories about our experiences with the same things. I seek to be part of the biome and contribute to its well being: At the same time, I seek to understand all these stories and more, to contribute more than I take, while taking only what I need to survive and protect the commons for future inhabitants of Earth. That is a just path.
Thunder and lightning woke me early Tuesday morning. We needed the rain and could use more. When I went for my daily walk a few hours later, the driveway was almost dry. The ground just soaked the water up, wanting more.
The next county over is experiencing drought conditions, noting one of the drier starts of a year. 51.8% of the state is experiencing moderate drought or abnormally dry conditions. I’m not a climatologist yet I would say this is the new normal.
Fields and pastures where I travel in Eastern Iowa show the strain of limited moisture. Some corn is planted and just emerging. Subsoil moisture, built during wetter seasons, can carry the plants only so far before they begin to show stress. What matters most in the growing cycle is not just whether it rains, but when. If heat and dry conditions settle in during July pollination, the crop has little margin for error. Today, we notice how quickly ponds and ditches recede after a decent rain. In many years, a single well-timed rain can bolster a crop. In others, storms miss us, and that absence becomes the story.
Lawns are beginning to green up after losing color over the winter. Garden soil remains pliable, yet hardens between rains and watering. We simply hope the next storm will stay longer than the last.
That I see such patterns, repeated over multiple seasons, is part of a broader conversation about climate change. While our current dry conditions can be attributed to natural variability, the increasing frequency of such conditions aligns with projections of more erratic precipitation and warmer temperatures. Drought cycles persist, making recovery more uncertain.
I remember the 2012 drought and how it negatively impacted corn yields. Luckily, soybeans had time to recover. In July, I attended a meeting with the governor and farm groups and came away with this conclusion:
Whether it was acknowledged or not, today’s meeting of farmers, citizens, elected officials, bureaucrats, media and advocates is what climate change looks like. Grown men and women who have invested a lifetime in doing what they think is right, facing the existential reality of a changing climate.
It is unclear whether an extended drought will take place this year. It depends upon soil moisture going in, weather timing, and heat. What I can say with some certainty is I’m glad it rained Tuesday morning and hope we have more. So much depends upon it.
Pelicans lifting from the lake surface before dawn.
Pelicans have been on the lake for a few weeks now. For the moment, they gather overnight on the east end, a loose white raft in the shallows, then lift off just before dawn to find better fishing. In time, they will move on, continuing north. It is another sign that, despite the odd turns in this year’s weird weather, spring has arrived.
These are American White Pelicans, and they are everywhere—far more than one might expect. On clear days, when flying into or out of the Cedar Rapids airport, the landscape below reveals why: it is patterned with reservoirs, river backwaters, sand pits, and lakes, all of them inviting to birds in transit. From the ground, one can see them gather into long, shifting V formations, angled north toward Minnesota and the Dakotas. For now, though, they are here — resting, feeding, and reminding us, in their numbers and movement, that the season is turning.
During the day, the pelicans scatter. Across the open water, individuals and small groups spread out, each bird taking up its own stretch of lake or backwater, like a sentinel. They are not simply feeding at random, but searching — reading the surface, the light, and subtle signs of fish below. Only later, when something is found, do scattered birds begin to draw together. The distances close, the spacing tightens, and the loose geometry of the day gives way to purpose. They gang up on fish for dinner.
It took me years to recognize these patterns. I have a lot more to understand about this seasonal guest. For now, I just see them lifting from the lake in the predawn light. Heading out for better feeding areas: the way I would if one of them.
Good people are working to address the climate crisis… just not in the Trump administration. The dominance of the president and his minions runs throughout the federal government to promote energy solutions that make climate change worse. More specifically, discussion about loosening the regulatory environment blocks needed conversations about addressing the climate crisis.
Since January 2025, the Congress held hearings that mention climate change. However, they hear mostly from industry representatives. Which industries? Groups like the American Petroleum Institute and U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Industry is urging Congress to create a more predictable, streamlined regulatory environment, emphasizing faster permitting, lower compliance costs, and clearer rules. They argue current regulations hinder investment, energy development, and competitiveness. They often frame climate policy in economic and security terms rather than scientific urgency. They do not address climate change, nor will they.
Few people I know don’t see the urgency of addressing the climate crisis.
Absent action by our federal government, there are voices we should recognize, beginning with Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, an atmospheric scientist. Global warming exists and Hayhoe doesn’t accept it on faith. According to her website, she crunches data, analyzes models, and helps engineers and city managers and ecologists quantify the impacts. She is everywhere on social media and tells the scientific truth about where our priorities should be.
Another person to follow is Bill McKibben, a prominent American environmentalist, author, and co-founder of the grassroots climate campaign 350.org. He is also founder of Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for action on climate and justice, according to his website.
There are others, yet Hayhoe and McKibben are in the middle of what is currently happening regarding the climate crisis. Follow them.
Blog for Iowa also recommends the handy climate change BS guide I first posted in 2015, “Is That Climate Change Article BS?” It’s a bit dated, yet still has good advice:
Skip climate articles by people who think the problem is hopeless or intractable — because it most certainly is not.
Skip articles written by George Will and his ilk.
Skip articles — especially longer climate essays — by authors who don’t explicitly tell you what temperature target or CO2 concentration target they embrace and how they’d go about attaining it.
Skip articles embracing Orwellian terms like “good Anthropocene.”
“One of the most important things we all need to know when it comes to climate action is this: we are not alone.,” Katharine Hayhoe recently said. I invite readers to follow Hayhoe and McKibben on social media if you are not already.
In Iowa we pay attention to the weather. On the first day of spring, unseasonably warm temperatures — climbing into the 70s and even 80s — were part of a broader “heat dome” pattern influencing much of the United States. Record-breaking heat hit the West, and the same atmospheric setup is pushing milder air into the Midwest, giving us an early, almost summer-like start to the season. Is it climate change? Yes — but not in a simple, one-to-one way. The high temperature today is forecast to be 83°F.
These conditions are unusual for March, yet they offer a timely opportunity to begin transitioning work outdoors. As the jet stream shifts and warmer air settles in, now is a good moment to prepare for seasonal tasks, adjust routines, and take advantage of this early stretch of favorable weather — keeping in mind that spring in Iowa rarely settles in all at once.
I’m awaiting arrival of a batch of seeds. When they are in hand, I’ll plant them indoors, followed by peppers, tomatoes and cucurbits over the next couple of weeks. I will use the warm weather to clear the space for the portable greenhouse. By Good Friday, potato tubs and onion and leek starts should be in the ground, the greenhouse assembled and in use. I am simply waiting for the soil to hit that perfect window of friability — crumbly, loose texture that breaks apart easily — and then, game on!
The bed near the front steps has Bluebells. They were a transplant from my in-laws’ home and thrived without me doing anything. They are just budding in the ground on March 20. I carefully cleared the surface and planted a number of old flower seeds, some dating to 2022. The idea is to have something else grow here after Bluebells are done. With old flower seeds, one never knows.
In the garage, I opened the box of onion sets only to find they were leeks. I looked at the order form and indeed, I had not ordered onions. These several weeks, I had been planning how to plant onions, but now the ship steers to starboard in order to make a new plan. Luckily my supplier still had some onion sets left, so I ordered them.
Days like this, I put on special clothing and just go to the garage. No plan, no urgency. Just me interacting with my environment and home. Things get done.
While moving the potato tubs to the designated plot, I found the ground too wet for digging, or even walking on it. Don’t want to compress soil, so I delayed for a few days until it dries out. Spring is off to a good start.
Open for business on the first day of Spring, March 20, 2026.
Canada geese on the margin between open water and ice.
Things are happening in Big Grove Township. Songbirds are migrating, the ice cover on the lake is melting, and parts of the ground are thawing. Ambient temperatures hit 68 degrees Fahrenheit on Monday — it was shirt sleeves weather. Due to high winds and combustible material everywhere, the National Weather Service issued a special weather statement with elevated fire danger in the mix. Welcome to the new winter.
Each day I spend an hour or so outdoors clearing the garden. Once the ground thaws it will be more time than that. There is a lot to do, yet I’ve been to this rodeo. Steady work as the ground is ready gets the garden in.
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